22 Dec 2003

Put a Needle on It

The Team Manager do was on Friday. I’d love to regale you all with insightful observations of my colleagues but I can’t as I missed most of it.

I always feel a little guilty leaving the office when the operators are still busy on the phones. I could feel the sneering looks burning into my back as we left.

We had a meal in one of those expensive café bars where they try to pass off a slice of meat on top of a bed of mashed potato, in the dead centre of a big plate, as food.

The meagre offering did little to line my stomach and within an hour I was smiling like the joker with black teeth. Call Centre Tony looked like he’d been drinking from a broken jam jar when we started at each other. It was a familiar argument; one of the great debates of our age:

Kylie verses Dannii.

We both accept that the two together would be something magical; bigger than the sum of their parts. However, separate them and the arguments start:

“Dannii is the ugly sister. The screaming skull.” Tony insisted. Pointing his finger at me in a threatening manner.

“Bollocks. She’s got her knockers, but I think she has a couple of outstanding features that put her ahead of Kylie.” I said.

Brenda’s honking laugh was ringing in my ears as I made a dash to the toilet.

It was when I got there that I realised how drunk I was. I stuck my head down the toilet bowl.

The restaurant manager woke me several hours later. I was clutching the toilet bowl and had the pattern of floor tile impressed on my cheek. He looked at me nervously as if I was a junkie who had over-dosed.

He was relieved when I grinned and managed to say “Red … Red … Wine.”

He was a Kylie man too.